From www.rollingstone.com:

Rage, Cornell Working Again

Rick Rubin overseeing new collaboration


Following months of speculation, rumors and hearsay, ex-Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell is again working with the remaining three members of Rage Against the Machine.
Rage guitarist Tom Morello, bassist Tim Commerford and drummer Brad Wilk are currently in Los Angeles in pre-production for an album with Cornell at the microphone and heavily bearded producer Rick Rubin behind the boards. The foursome have reportedly penned upwards of twenty songs.

The quartet will not be calling themselves Rage Against the Machine, but they have yet to settle on a formal moniker. Legal complications -- Rage and Cornell are currently signed to different labels (Epic and A&M, respectively) -- will obviously have to be ironed out before any official release dates can be issued.

Rage have been sans frontman since singer Zack De La Rocha left the band last October. Not long after, rumors circulated that Cornell had been jamming with the remaining band members, rumors Rage confirmed at February's Grammy Awards. "[Cornell is] one of the greatest singers and songwriters in rock history, and jamming with him was off the hook," Morello said at the time. "We were just making up new, exciting rock . . . the music that we made in the couple of days that we jammed together was really groundbreaking and fantastic, and was so exciting."

De La Rocha meanwhile is hard at work on what will be his solo debut, having called in Roots' drummer ?uestlove, Roni Size, noted producer Dan "The Automator" Nakamura and DJs Shadow and Premier. Epic Records has yet to set a release date for the album and no title is known just yet.

Calls to Epic regarding the Rage/Cornell collaboration were not returned at press time.

GREG HELLER
(May 18, 2001)